New UCL Press Titles for October

October sees the publication of 4 titles, all of which are available to download open access from our website.

Outrage

The Rise of Religious Offence in Contemporary South Asia

Edited by Paul Rollier, Kathinka Frøystad, and Arild Engelsen Ruud

Whether spurred by religious images or academic history books, hardly a day goes by in South Asia without an incident or court case occurring as a result of hurt religious feelings. The sharp rise in blasphemy accusations over the past few decades calls for an investigation into why offence politics has become so pronounced, and why it is observable across religious and political differences. This book does just that. Bringing together researchers in Anthropology, Religious Studies, Languages, South Asia Studies and History, each chapter focuses on a recent case or context of alleged blasphemy or desecration in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Find out more and download it for free here.

The Contemporary Medieval in Practice

Clare A. Lees and Gillian R. Overing

Contemporary arts, both practice and methods, offer medieval scholars innovative ways to examine, explore, and reframe the past. This book ‘does’ Medieval Studies differently by bringing it into relation with the field of contemporary arts and by making ‘practice’, in the sense used by contemporary arts and by creative-critical writing, central to it. Intersecting with a number of urgent critical discourses and cultural practices, such as the study of the environment and the ethics of understanding bodies, identities, and histories, this short, accessible book offers medievalists a distinctive voice in multi-disciplinary, trans-chronological, collaborative conversations about the Humanities.

Find out more and download it for free here.
 

Georges Perec’s Geographies

Material, Performative and Textual Spaces

Edited by Charles Forsdick, Andrew Leak, and Richard Phillips

Georges Perec, novelist, filmmaker and essayist, was one of the most inventive and original writers of the twentieth century. Georges Perec’s Geographies is the first book to offer a rounded picture of Perec’s geographical interests. Divided into two parts, Part I, Perec’s Geographies, explores the geographies within his work in film, literature and radio, from descriptions of streets to the spaces of his texts, while Part II, Perecquian Geographies, explores geographies in a range of material and metaphorical forms, including photographic essays, soundscapes, theatre, dance and writing, created by those directly inspired by Perec.

Find out more and download it for free here.

Socialism, Capitalism and Alternatives

Area Studies and Global Theories

Edited by Peter J. S. Duncan and Elisabeth Schimpfössl

Through analysis of post-socialist Russia and Central and Eastern Europe, as well as of the United Kingdom, China and the United States, Socialism, Capitalism and Alternatives confronts the difficulty we face in articulating alternatives to capitalism, socialism and threatening populist regimes. Beginning with accounts of the impact of capitalism on countries left behind by the planned economies, the volume moves on to consider how China has become a beacon of dynamic economic growth, aggressively expanding its global influence. The final section of the volume poses alternatives to the ideological dominance of neoliberalism in the West.

Find out more and download it for free here.